Moving

Kate at 39 weeks (and nine months!)

I took these on Monday over at the new apartment, while we were moving stuff in. Kate likes the carpet over there. (It's new! I almost feel bad about moving in there with a baby. Almost.) She's getting around a little better--we've seen her go forwards a few "steps" at a time, but there's still a lot of backwards and sideways action. She's fun to watch.



Kate marked her nine-month birthday yesterday by falling off the bed. We were both rather shaken up by the experience, though she seemed more surprised than hurt.

Geocaching

While we were in Ohio we got to go geocaching with our friends Julie and Mark and their four kids. We went looking for this cache, on the grounds of the Ohio Soldiers and Sailors Orphans Home in Xenia. It's a multi-cache, which means that you go around to several different places and find clues to get the coordinates for the next site.



We liked the architctural details on the front of this chapel. The clue we were looking for was in the graveyard behind it, but some grounds maintenance people told us that there was a hornet or yellow jacket nest back there and someone had been stung earlier that day, so we stayed by the chapel while Mark went and found the clue.




J.C. up a tree.



Twins Chris and Josh check out a daddy-long-legs on the sidewalk.



Back on the hunt again! Kate is perfectly happy on walks, as long as she has something to hold.



Emma gets a "one, two, three, WHEEEEEE!"



Julie found the cache! It's an ammo box with various "treasures," and a notebook for signing in.



If you take something out, you leave something behind. The kids crowd around to see what they want.



Emma has an egg.



"Take a picture of my dog!"



This egg was in the cache also, but we left it for someone else.



We had a nice morning out, walking around the grounds and enjoying the cool breezy weather, and we got home in time to go out to lunch with my family.

Kate at 38 weeks

I really did take these pictures last Monday, I just haven't gotten around to posting them. I need to take more today!




Kate attempts to do "The Eensy-Weensy Spider" while holding a leaf. Well, not really, but that's what it looks like. She certainly seems to be concentrating hard on something!

"Are you gonna eat that?"

You may look at this picture and say, "Is is this man doing what I think he's doing?" Yes, it's true--this is my dad, and he's putting applesauce on his pizza. He's done this for years. Apparently it helps tone down the spiciness of the pizza. Doug, intrigued, had to try it as well, and declared that it "works pretty well, actually." No one else felt compelled to confirm this.

As we were discussing this odd gustatory habit, Betsey said, "Do you know what his favorite sandwich is? Bologna, ketchup, pickles, and peanut butter." I asked, "So, do you have a name for this concoction?" and Dad said, "Lunch!"

Glen Helen

After Young's, we went for a short walk in Glen Helen. Betsey came along with us. We had Kate in this baby backpack carrier that my mom borrowed for us to use. She seemed to enjoy it a lot.

There used to be a neat swinging bridge in Glen Helen. Apparently it was taken out sometime while I was in high school. Bummer.

Here's the yellow springs for which the town is named. I propped my camera on a rock to steady it for a long exposure.

Young's Jersey Dairy

Young's in Yellow Springs is one of those great little places that gets mentioned in roadside tour guides. Actually it's not a little place anymore at all. It used to be little.



We took Kate to see the goats. Not for long, because they seemed determined to eat the stroller. It wasn't our stroller, after all, it was one my mom borrowed from someone. Can't have goats eating a borrowed stroller.

I should mention that they do have cows at this place, too. Jersey cows. We have this running joke with my dad, who grew up on a Guernsey farm in Illinois. We'll say, "Look at that cow, Dad, isn't it beautiful?" and he'll say, "No, it's a Jersey!" I didn't get any pictures of the cows this time, though.



After the goats comes the ice cream (not necessarily in that order, but usually). Doug got cinnamon and black walnut. I got peaches and cream, and strawberry. (Doug is a connoisseur of unusual flavors--there's a company in Seattle that makes a lavender flavored ice cream that he gets a kick out of. And yes, I did have to look up how to spell "connoisseur").



Here Kate goes after Doug's ice cream...



...and gets a little taste (just the cinnamon, not the walnut). Yum!

I pretty much don't eat sugar, since it makes me tired and cranky (I tell people that if I eat sugar I burst into tears and then fall asleep), but a little ice cream on very rare occasions is a special treat, and Young's is probably worth a little crankiness.

Fun with the macro lens

I had lots of chances to try out my new lens on flowers and bugs. I ended up with a lot more throw-away shots than keepers (especially on the bugs--darn things keep moving around) but I'm learning!



The morning after a rainstorm I took some shots of the water droplets on the flowers. This one was especially fun--I didn't notice till later that you can see the car (upside-down) in the water drops.

My mom has these flowers called Autumn Joy Sedum in front of the house. They attract lots of bees--big, beautiful carpenter bees, bumble bees (I didn't get any pictures of those), and honey bees, as well as butterflies and flies. Of course all of these attract a fair number of spiders as well. My sister Betsey, who loves bugs and has worked several summers collecting and cataloging bees, says she's going to plant some of these flowers at her house (when she has one).





Out of consideration for my friends who don't like creepy-crawly things, I have made these thumbnails very small. Don't click unless you really want to see.

Spacious Skies

We flew out early on a Wednesday morning. Our flight was at 9:00, and we had to leave our house at a little after 6:00, so we were feeling rather groggy. Doug dozed off shortly after takeoff, but then I woke him up to tell him that we could see Rainier, Adams, and St. Helens all at the same time. I knew he would want to see them. As we were gaping out the window Mt. Hood came into view as well. We'd never had such a great view. Of course I got out the camera (this picture is stitched together from four shots--pretty good, no?) Then a little later I told Doug I could see another mountain past Hood, and he said it must be Jefferson. It was a great day for mountains.

Kate slept a lot, and when she woke up she was mostly content to sit and play with whatever was handy (we brought along her pencil from the fair). People commented on what a good little traveler she was.

I got out the camera again as we were nearing Detroit and took some pictures of the clouds. That second one has some shapes in it that make me think of bears.



In Detroit we got on a little commuter plane that took us to the Dayton airport, and my family picked us up there.

Back from Ohio

We're home! Actually we got back Wednesday night, but I just haven't gotten myself together enough to post anything. I took over a thousand photos and I've been going through them and picking out the ones I want to post. Big job!

We had a good trip. When we scheduled it we didn't know that we were going to be moving right after we got back, so the timing was a little awkward. It was made more awkward when we realized that, though Doug's classes at one college start on the 26th, the other college where he teaches started on the 21st. That's the day we got back. We didn't notice this until the day before we left. So Doug ended up missing the first day of class, but it worked out okay. I'm glad we got to go. Kate got to see her grandparents again (or, more specifically, they got to see her, which they hadn't since she was three months old).

I was born in California but grew up mostly in Ohio. My parents still live in the same house where they were when my youngest sister was born. That will always be where I'm from. Things change--places change, and people change--but it's nice to get back. There's something about the Midwest that my senses respond to, knowing I'm back "home." The air is heavier. I imagine that the colors even seem a little richer. We missed the fireflies, but got a fine concert of loudly singing insects every night. That's Ohio in late summer.

We had a good time but were very glad (and tired!) to get home. Now we're trying to track down some boxes to use in our move. Scott said to try Grocery Outlet. The people at Grocery Outlet said to try Safeway. The people at Safeway said to try Fred Meyer. We haven't tried them yet. Now Doug is off helping with an Eagle Scout project, Kate is taking her morning nap, and I'm going to try to get a few of these pictures posted!

Kate at 37 weeks

Kate demonstrates her "almost crawling" technique. She's got the hand part down, but can't quite figure out what to do with the back end. She still manages to get around quite a bit.